No member of Congress was more essential to Neil M. Gorsuch’s ascent to the Supreme Court than Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who blocked President Barack Obama’s nominee for the job and then spearheaded the confirmation process for Gorsuch.

Last week found McConnell (R-Ky.) and Gorsuch traveling the Bluegrass State together for a tour of the senator’s alma maters. “President Trump simply could not have made a better nominee,” McConnell said in introducing Gorsuch before a packed-house lecture at the McConnell Center at the University of Louisville.

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“All of this indicates that he’s just ethically tone-deaf,” said Deborah L. Rhode, a Stanford University law professor and highly cited authority on legal ethics.

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The Fund for American Studies said it secured the location for the speech before inviting Gorsuch. Stanford’s Rhode argued that “Supreme Court justices have leverage” and that Gorsuch could have agreed to the speech only if it were held elsewhere, or scheduled for another meeting of the group.